Due to the difficulty of comparing different brands of French horn mouthpieces with each other, I’ve put together this French horn mouthpiece chart to display the measurements of some of the most popular mouthpieces all in one place.

The links in the chart take you either to the manufacturer’s website, Amazon, or Woodwind&Brasswind.com to purchase or for more information. You can view all the French horn mouthpieces available at WWBW.com by clicking this link.

French Horn Mouthpiece Chart

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French Horn Mouthpiece Characteristics:

Maker and Model: This should be pretty obvious. The links in this column will take you to a site where you can purchase or to the maker’s website.

1- or 2-piece and Thread Type: Is this model a complete mouthpiece, or does it have a screw rim/cup. There are various types of threads – in general they are all compatible with others of the same name (ie: PHC work with other PHC but not with any Giardinelli), although sometimes Giardinelli cups and rims will have a “step” where the rim and cup join, some people find this distracting, some don’t even notice.

Rim ID (Inner Diameter):Probably the most important measurement for how you interact with the mouthpiece, and one of the hardest to accurately compare between manufacturers. This measurement is the inner diameter of the rim taken around where the face of the rim curves in to make the cup. Different makers can measure this point at slightly different places along that curve, so although it can’t be used as an exact comparison, it’s a good place to start.

Rim Shape: Almost as important as the inner diameter is the shape of the rim. Some of the more common shapes include slightly vague descriptions like round, flat, semi-round, and semi-flat. Since these are often given by the manufacturer, the actual radius and feel can vary and is very much a personal preference. A defined high pointmeans that the mouthpiece will often feel a little thinner (since the lips will come in contact with the highest point first) than a round or flat contour, even if the rim thickness is the same or greater. A reverse-peak will put the highest point toward the outside of the rim, which helps to “bunch” the lips in toward the center and can help a smaller ID feel a little bigger. A defined inner edge or bite means that the transition from the rim face to the inner cup is sharper (rather than rounded), and many feel that this gives better articulation (at the expense of slurs). It, like almost everything rim-related, is very much a personal preference.

Rim Width/Rim OD (Outer Diameter): Either a measure of the rim thickness itself (this will usually be around 4-6mm) or a measure of the outside diameter of the rim (which is going to be around 24mm). Similar to Inner Diameter, this measurement is not always taken at the same place from one manufacturer to another, and so it’s not always a 1-to-1 comparison. As discussed in the Rim Shape section, the contour can also have an impact on how thick a rim feels.

Cup Depth: A measure of the inside of the mouthpiece to (generally) where the bore begins. It usually starts wherever the rim ID measurement was taken (which can vary) and the ending point depends on both manufacturer and the precise cup shape, but this is still a useful place to start comparing. Whenever measurements were given by the manufacturer I used those, but many still use ambiguous terms like “medium” and “deep”.

Cup Shape: This, plus the cup depth and bore, have a great impact on the sound produced by the mouthpiece. There are a wide variety of cup shapes out there, and makers often use slightly confusing language to describe the differences. A V-shaped cup is fairly self-explanatory, as is a U-shape (also described as a cup-shaped), while a bowl shape is a U-shape with a more gradual curve. Concave, convex, and straight usually refer to the sides of the mouthpiece, as the cup transitions into the bore. While rims are important to match to your own face, a cup should be matched more to a specific horn – this is the reason many people use two-piece mouthpieces! As a very rough rule, Kruspe/8D style horns like deeper, more V-shaped cup shapes, while Geyer style horns respond better to more cup or bowl-shaped cups. More info on matching cups to horns here!

Bore: This number refers to the size of the hole at the bottom of the cup at its smallest. Bore is often expressed in drill numbers (1 (5.79mm) being the biggest, and around 20 (4.1mm) being quite small), but I’ve converted them into millimeters for consistency. A larger bore (all other things being equal) provides less resistance to air, but in return requires much more air support and more efficient breathing. Although it used to be popular to use very large bores (5.8 – 5.2mm) many horns (and players) respond better to more moderate sizes (5 – 4.6mm)The flare and length of the backbore (although not on this chart) is equally important to the blowing and intonation characteristics of a mouthpiece.

Other Things to Consider

Mouthpiece fit is incredibly important. Mouthpieces made in America are designed to fit a horn leadpipe with a Morse-0 taper (all American horns), but European horns (and mouthpieces) are built with a slightly different taper. If you are mixing European and American horns and mouthpieces, it’s worth talking to the mouthpiece maker to make sure it’s got the right taper for your horn’s leadpipe.

Heavyweight mouthpieces (or stem weights for normal-weight mouthpieces) can have a dramatic impact on the way a mouthpiece responds. They are not universally good or bad, and indeed depend on the combination of the player, horn, and mouthpiece. If you’re interested in trying one, it’s worth either getting two copies of the mouthpiece (one heavy and one normal weight) or get a stem weight that can be removed to see which actually works better.

The plating or material of the mouthpiece is another thing to consider. Make sure to read Bob Osmun’s excellent remarks about mouthpiece plating below. Silver-plated brass is the most common metal for instrument mouthpieces, and is always a good place to start for younger players.

Other options include gold plating, stainless steel, and titanium:

Gold sounds exactly the same as silver, but since gold is both less likely to cause irritation for some players and feels more “slippery”, it is preferred by some. In my experience, the gold plating can wear off after a few years (as can silver plating) so replating may be needed every few years, but this depends largely on the quality and thickness of the silver plate!

Stainless steel mouthpieces are made out of solid stainless steel (not plated), and the rims have a slipperiness somewhere between silver- and gold-plated brass. The sound of a stainless steel cup supposed to be a little different, as well, with a slightly faster attack and a slightly brighter sound. Some feel stainless projects better, and some think it doesn’t it – similar to heavy weight mouthpieces, for some people and instruments it works well, for others it doesn’t.

Titanium is sometimes applied as a coating to stainless steel mouthpiece rims, to give them a feel slipperier than gold. Because of the plating process it is supposed to last an incredibly long time and shouldn’t need replating. Solid titanium mouthpieces are, to my knowledge, only made by one company, Giddings and Webster, and I haven’t heard much about them either good or bad – but they are costly!

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This is a great resource – thank you for compiling it! I had the thought a while back to make something like this into a mobile app. Pickett Brass has an app called “Brass Mouthpiece Comparator.” If you have any programming skills–or know anybody who does–this would be a really useful tool.

Best wishes, Travis

Colin

Thanks Travis – hope you’re doing well. I have thought about making this information into an app (or at least easily viewable on a mobile device), but figured this would be a little easier to start!

I really enjoyed your Mouthpiece comparison Chart (I can’t imagine the time you must have put into it). I think it will be a really useful resource. I know I’ll be consulting it.

I did notice that you seem to have a good deal of confusion about materials and plating. You use terms like “nickel”, “nickel-silver”, and “silver” more or less interchangeably. Let me, if a might, make a couple of clarifications.

All mouthpieces, to my knowledge, are made of brass, stainless steel, or titanium. Paxman Halstead-Chidell did make nickel silver mouthpieces but changed to brass years ago.

Nickel is never used as a mouthpiece plating, except for a few very cheap imported mouthpieces. The reason for this is that since nickel is so much harder than brass, when it wears or is damaged it exposes sharp edges rather than wearing down smoothly, as softer metals do. In the jewelry business nickel is often used as a base coat under gold to bring out the color and to prevent the very thin gold plating used from sinking into the base metal. Older Holton mouthpieces used a heavy nickel plate under the silver to take advantage of the “self-leveling” properties of nickel. As the coating become thicker the contours of the base metal are softened. This was done to avoid having to polish the mouthpiece. Thick coatings of nickel also tend to build up more heavily around sharp corners: the “edge effect”. Older Holton mouthpieces often have a very pronounced bulge of excess plating around the end of the shank.

Almost all mouthpieces are silver plated. Silver retains its polish better than brass, tastes better, and protects the player from exposure to the lead in the brass. Gold can be plated directly on the brass or over a silver base coat (as we do). Gold is no less durable than brass. How long it wears is purely a function of how heavy a coat was initially applied. When I was a kid we bought Giardinelli mouthpieces that had plating that lasted for about two weeks. We guarantee the plating on our mouthpieces for two years and haven’t had to replate any yet.

For the record, Osmun rims are available in silver plate or gold over silver, both on brass. We also make rims in delrin.

As far a steel or titanium mouthpieces are concerned, I haven’t seen any convincing musical or practical arguments for them. I think their existence has more to do with some less-than-completely-busy machine shops looking for some new business working with materials they’re already familiar with.

Please accept this information as a contribution, not a criticism. I think your chart is a wonderfully useful addition to our knowledge base.

Regards,

Bob Osmun

Colin

Bob, thanks for all your great information! I agree that the ´materials´ section is a bit of a mess. I think I generally just copied and pasted whatever the website that I was using had, and those terms were not consistent. It shouldn’t take very long to go over and make that information clearer.

Thanks again for your input – please feel free to share the link however you see fit – your website is a great resource (and I’m a big fan of your mouthpiece line)!

William Klingelhoffer

Well done!! Very comprehensive. I have a couple of comments The Schilke 31B was a copy of Frank Brouk’s mouthpiece and it is supposed to be 18 mm ID. Also there is an additional measurement that ought to be considered. Stork blanks (my Stork Orval 51/4 is 2 5/8 in. long) are longer than Laskey or Schilke or Houser blanks–which are 2 1/2 in. Best Wishes, Bill

Colin

Bill, thanks for your information. While I’ve heard the same thing about the 31B, the Schilke website gives the internal diameter as 17.4mm. I wonder if it has changed over the years, but I wanted to use the most accurate and current measurements – considering that many people that may need a resource such as this would likely be buying new mouthpieces!

As far as the blank length, while I think that’s an excellent idea, that kind of information isn’t usually easily available (at least not online). Once I get a greater percentage of the available mouthpieces up on the site, I’ll likely try to add that – thanks for the feedback!